


Death by a thousand cuts

by smith_and_weaver



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Romance, Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-23
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:55:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 9,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23277439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smith_and_weaver/pseuds/smith_and_weaver
Summary: She is NOT crying. It’s the wind.  She could be at Hogwarts if that is what she wanted.  Happily playing exploding snap in the Gryffindor common room, eating sumptuous meals in the grand hall, running through the snow to Hogsmeade for last minute stocking stuffers from Honeydukes. She could be laid out, naked on an enormous double bed in front of a roaring fire with a sable head buried between her thighs.-- A tangent fanfic set in the world of The Heartbreak Prince (by Diasterisms). Rey and Professor Solo work out some kinks in their relationship (and also the other kind of kinks) as the festive season rolls around. Expect some angst, fluff and maybe some light smut if I can psych myself to write that for the first time...also a bit of a tribute to London Town which i miss dearly--
Relationships: Ben Solo - Relationship, Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 16
Kudos: 128





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [diasterisms](https://archiveofourown.org/users/diasterisms/gifts).
  * Inspired by [the heartbreak prince](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21796579) by [diasterisms](https://archiveofourown.org/users/diasterisms/pseuds/diasterisms). 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Some mention of grim childhood, drug/alcohol use by parents ******

Rey hunches her shoulders and digs her hands deeper into her coat pockets. Her fingers rub the pilled lining, her left hand worrying a hole that has been steadily growing for the last two winters. Wriggling a finger inside the hole she can feel the cheap synthetic lining rubbing against the polyester outer layer of her only winter coat.  
‘you had one job winter coat’ thinks Rey as London’s winter wind whips her hair out of its bun ‘all you had to do was see me through one more winter’. 

Rey’s right hand reflexively grips the firm hilt of her Aspen wand as it lies nestled in her other pocket. ‘Next winter I’ll buy a new coat’ she murmurs, the words repeating in her head as her feet speed up carrying her further from the grim estate behind her and towards to gates to the park. ‘A new coat, a new coat’ echoing in her head with each footstep. 

As she enters London Fields the temperature seems to drop as the wind skitters across the grass and the barren trees but Rey sighs with relief. Even in the bleak midwinter this patch of green in the drear of east London feels like a haven. Rey spies a few children in bright coats and hats streaking past on scooters with a pair of mothers’ huddled on a bench nearby. Their gloved hands gripping Starbucks as they chat and idly watch the children. Tk-Maxx and Iceland bags at lie at their feet, the spoils of a last minute Christmas shop no doubt. Rey smiles a tiny smile at them as she briskly walks past. 

As the years spent at Hogwarts have mounted, Rey increasingly feels like she watches her ‘normal’ life in London like she is observing an exhibit at the Zoo. The people, their cares and their worries; who will win celebrity love Island? What will the Christmas number 1 be? Will West Ham be relegated this season? These minutiae of daily life swirl around her but she feels completely removed from them, and in truth she is. She has taken a side step into a completely different and dazzling world.  
‘But do you really fit in there?’ A dark little voice pipes up in Rey’s mind as she gazes at the women on the bench still. 

‘Merry Christmas love!’ the cockney accented, cheerful voice pulls Rey from her dark thoughts as one of the women on the bench toasts her with her Starbucks grande.  
‘Merry Christmas’ Rey mumbles back as she passes and continues up the path towards London Fields Lido. 

Through the metal bars, the surface of the lido is visible. Aquamarine in colour and covered with a gently moving collection of autumn leaves that eddy and swirl as the breeze whips the water. Rey stops and watches the ripples and currents, the woman’s words echoing in her head. 

‘Stupid Christmas’ mutters Rey to a startled squirrel darting through the fence. Its not that Rey is opposed to Christmas in general, in fact there is a small, rebellious part of Rey that LOVES Christmas. The lights, the food, the presents…she just hates HER Christmas and the Christmases of the past. The ones when her parents’ hangovers didn’t let up until 4pm when the drinking started again and the frozen turkey burnt in the oven as her Mum tossed back gin and tonics with whichever drunk loser was dossing on their couch that season and no one ever turned the lights in the tree on. 

‘But’ Rey silently tells the lone squirrel who has frozen in terror when sensing her presence.  
‘This Christmas SUX more than any other and it hasn’t even officially begun yet’.  
Deeming the steely faced Rey to not be a threat after all, the grey squirrel springs into action and leaps up a birch tree growing by the edge of the Lido. Rey sighs as her audience departs and turns back to the path to continue her solo journey. 

Solo. His name. 

‘Stupid name’ mutters Rey as she stomps towards the far gates of the park leading towards Hackney central. Solo- meaning alone. But he isn’t, is he? No. 

Rey’s pace picks up and she stomps her feet harder as she walks. Its his fault that she is here, freezing her ass off in her crappy winter coat, in this crappy corner of London, with her crappy parents getting high in her crappy excuse for a home. Rey angrily swipes at a tear as it burns into her eyes. She is NOT crying. It’s the wind. She could be at Hogwarts if that is what she wanted. Happily playing exploding snap in the Gryffindor common room, eating sumptuous meals in the grand hall, running through the snow to Hogsmeade for last minute stocking stuffers from Honeydukes. She could be laid out, naked on an enormous double bed in front of a roaring fire with a sable head buried between her thighs.

‘FUCK’ shouts Rey as that last image flashes unbidden into her mind.  
‘Alright love?’ asks an old geezer in a flat cap holding a greyhound racing card in one hand and the stump of a pencil in the other.  
‘Yeah alright’ mutters Rey as she storms out of the gates and into the high street, resolutely NOT thinking about him or his mouth or cunnilingus AT ALL.


	2. Chapter 2

When Rey steps out of Hackney Central library its almost dark, well as dark as London can ever be. The street lights create amber halos as they burn in the late December evening mist. The neon light above the kebab shop and the mini cab signs cast magenta and ice blue shadows on Mare street as Rey hitches her enchanted satchel across her body and hunches her shoulders into her pitiful coat. She hadn’t meant to spend so long in the library but upon reflection, its not like she had anywhere else to be…anything else to do. 

For a while she had browsed the best seller section of the shelves. No matter how long she spent in the wizarding world Rey never lost her love of muggle literature. Hackney library always had great selection of the books nominated for the latest Man Booker prize and Rey, after months of work, had created a spell that allowed her, with a subtle tap of her wand, to siphon a whole muggle book into a single roll of parchment that, when tapped with the same subtle wand movement, reverted back to novel form. Rey now planned to devour copious amounts of literature without a single overdue fine. 

After adding the new Margaret Attwood and Donna Tartt to her collection as well as the entire Elena Feranti series, Rey had retired to the reading corner to….well read. But as she had dug in her satchel to pull out a slab of chocolate to nibble on, her hands felt the soft skein of wool that she had shoved in her bag at the last second. She’d pulled the skein out and inspected in. Midnight black shot through with glittering sliver, the wool shimmered like a living thing. Rey had bought it in Hogsmead on a whim. It had made her think of him the second her she laid eyes on it. Dark but with light shining though. Yes. Him. Seated in the depths of Hackney Library, Rey had sighed and pulled her rosewood knitting needles from her satchel as well. 

Her grandmother had taught her to knit. A long ago memory. A smell of lavender, a warm house covered in patchwork, of fat ginger cats and a kettle singing on the stove. These fleeting memories and an ability of knit are all she has left. Something happened, as it always did, and they didn’t see Granny anymore. 

Now tucked in her satchel lies the finished product.  
‘Stupid stupid’ thinks Rey, flushing red as she pulls her black floppy beanie (two pounds at Primark four years ago) further down over her ears. She banishes any thought of that fire lit room, that bed, that stupid fantasy that somehow that is where she would spend Christmas day. And knitting him a scarf?? In a way she is glad that she is here…that she heard what she heard last night in the deserted hallway. 

They hadn’t explicitly discussed Christmas…but then again sometimes discussion wasn’t their strong suite. And in their defence, time was usually limited. Stolen hours here and there, sometimes stolen minutes, slid into dark corners, empty classrooms and once…rather memorably in Plutt’s supply cupboard. When Rey hadn’t boarded the first Hogwarts express of the Christmas break with most of the other students she had assumed that he would know. That she was staying. It didn’t need to be said. She had much better uses for her mouth in the times they had snatched together since then. 

In fact, it was just which one of those uses she might employ imminently which was distracting her as she had slipped around the corner towards his chambers three days before Christmas. She had been swathed in the invisibility cloak and already feeling flushed and wet in anticipation when she had suddenly pulled up short. Voices. 

She’d heard his huff of a laugh and a muttered few words she couldn’t make out. Inching a few feet forward she had peered towards his chamber door to see him leaning casually against the door frame, bathed in firelight. Headmaster Kenobi had stood in front of him, his robed back to her. Rey had sucked in a breath and flattened herself against the wall.  
‘Well’ she had heard Kenobi say ‘I’m so glad that you have agreed to come, your Mother will be so pleased and Mon Mothma is more than happy to host the festivities here at the castle while I entertain in Somerset. Are you sure I can’t convince you to leave with me later this evening?’  
‘Oh no’ came Ben’s reply, a self-deprecating smile gracing his features ‘There is only so much socialising I can take, but thank you for the invitation’. From Rey’s precariously concealed position she had been able to see Kenobi reach out and put a hand on the larger man’s shoulder.  
‘It will get easier Ben’ he’d murmured, his tone avuncular. Rey had tried to study as much of Professor Solo’s face as she could see, silhouetted as it was against the fire light. A mixture of expressions appeared to be vying for control- fear, anger and sadness…most of all that crushing sadness settled onto his features as he had muttered ‘maybe’ in reply to Kenobi. The two men stood that way for a moment longer, Ben’s eyes trained resolutely on the stone floor in front of him and Kenobi’s piecing gaze fixed on his face. Rey hadn’t dared breath lest the smallest sound gave her away. Suddenly Kenobi’s hand had dropped and he had turned to leave passing so close to Rey that she felt the cloak rustle as he strode down the corridor. Rey had pressed herself harder against the wall, her eyes trained on Ben, his arms still braced in the doorway and his face a mask of sadness and before he spun on his heal and retreated into his chambers, the heavy wooden door shutting firmly behind him. 

Rey had eyed that door for what felt like an eternity. She could have just taken a few steps and gently knocked. He would have opened the door as he always did and she could have let herself be cradled in that warm little piece of bliss that they had fashioned together. She could even have tried for once to act like a grown up and confessed about the overheard conversation. 

But what would it have changed? As she had stood there pressed against the wall while her headmaster strode by, the grim reality of her…their… situation finally hit Rey with the force of the Hogwarts express. She had just witnessed in no uncertain terms how little she really was part of Ben’s life. Could never be part of his life. Everything they had, every moment that was so dear to Rey was in fact just snatched, hidden, clandestine, illicit…wrong. Wrong. Judged. Tarnished. Or would be if it were to be exposed. 

And so, turning away from the closed door and letting heavy feet carry her towards the Gryffindor tower, for the first time since that letter had floated into her eleven-year-old life, Rey decided to leave behind her beautiful wizarding world, her haven, and return to her dreary, grim muggle life.


	3. Chapter 3

Rey makes her way down Mare street towards London fields, she dodges the usual characters as well as festive revellers ducking in and out of the brightly lit pubs and wine bars along the street. Her breath hangs in the air in front of her as she turns off down an alley way towards the park gates. Rey starts off across the park, the shape of the estate looming through the trees. Thin strands of mist gather across the grass and wrap around the trunks of the trees. A fox darts across the path in front of Rey, ‘bold as brass these London foxes’ muses Rey until she suddenly feels it. A shiver passes down her spine. A pricking of her thumbs. A tweak of her spidey senses…she isn’t alone. 

The path Rey is on is running next to the Lido fence and is cloaked in shadows from the pool’s buildings. Rey knows that there are many reasons why the park shouldn’t necessarily be deserted at 5pm on the night before Christmas eve. Hell, the gates aren’t even locked yet. The local gang of kids from the estate could be out looking for mischief or someone to sell skunk to, hipsters on their way to the cool bars of Hackney and Hoxton could be taking a short cut. But something feels off. Rey realises that it isn’t a presence she is sensing, it’s the feeling of being watched that is making her skin crawl. Someone is watching her and she can’t see them. 

In one pocket Rey’s hands tightens around her aspen wand and in the other, around her house keys. Witch she may almost be but she is also a London girl, well versed with the very real perils of this down and out corner of the city that all the gentrification in the world can’t quite erase. She knows the effectiveness of a well placed key between the ribs followed by a hasty sprint for the park gates. She also knows this might be a LOT less conspicuous than stunning a muggle in the middle of London. 

Rey keeps her pace light and even. The path running by the Lido joins another path in a matter of meters and this wider path tracks through open heath straight to the gates that open practically onto her door step. If she can just get onto that main stretch of path then she will feel safer, more exposed but less hidden. 

Rey is almost out of the shadows cast by the building around the lido when she feels arms lock around her body in a vice like grip. Acting out of pure instinct, Rey relaxes into the grip as she slides her hand clutching her keys out of her pocket. Feeling some give in the arms at her unexpected lack of resistance, Rey seizes the opportunity and whirls on her toes to face her as yet unseen foe. With her longest key wedged between her clenched fist Rey blindly lashes out at where she guesses a set of ribs to be. Rey hears a soft ‘ooof’ of pain and she freezes. 

She knows that voice. Even in the midst of her adrenaline fogged brain, in the middle of a park, in the middle of London, she knows him.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **There is a little tiny bit of non-consensual physical manhandling in this chapter ******

‘Rey…ow, jesus, fuck that hurt’ rumbles a voice like chocolate and razor blades.  
‘Ben??’ Gasps Rey, her breath coming in short pants, like she has run a marathon. ‘Ben?’ She gasps again her fist still raised to strike ‘What the fuck do you think you are doing?’ 

Rey squints into the dark as she speaks and she can just make out his dark features, just the highlights of his pale face visible in the gloom. It doesn’t help that he seems to be clothed completely in black. Ben raises a hand and cups Rey’s key shod fist in his significantly larger one. ‘Can we lower the weapon please Miss Niima’ he snaps, exerting the gentlest of downwards pressure on Rey’s wrist. ‘And would you care to explain why you, an extremely talented witch, chose to accost me with what appears to be a set of…house keys?’ It’s the disdain in his voice that really gets Rey’s blood boiling. 

‘Perhaps you would like to explain to me Sir, why you feel it is appropriate to lurk in the shadows of a park and accost young girls as they walk home from the library?’ She stares straight into his coal black eyes ‘or is this perhaps a kink of yours you just haven’t shared with me yet?’ 

Suddenly Rey finds herself crashing into Ben’s chest as he gently but firmly tucks her fist he is still holding behind her back and pushes her body towards him. Without her arms to steady her, Rey collides with his sternum in a manner that is neither expected or pleasant. Rey wrenches her fist out of his grip and shoves her hand into his granite like shoulder to propel her body back a few inches from his. Ben’s arms clamp around her lower back as he tries to hold her against him.  
‘Rey, stop’ he pleads his voice softer ‘I just…you just left. I waited for you last night and then this morning you were just gone.’  
‘And so you did what Ben?’ Counters Rey her blood still up, ‘you thought you would stalk me in the dark and manhandle me like a…a monster’ the last word lacks the punch she intended as a gust of icy wind whips across the grass and Rey shivers violently. ‘You’re freezing Rey’ says Ben in a firm low voice ‘lets not do this here, come’ his arms tighten around her and before she has time to realise what is happening Rey’s body is tugged flush with her professors’ and out of the corner of her eye she sees the hand clutching his wand flick before the air is squeezed from her lungs, her head feels like it is being pressed in a vice and a loud crack echoes in her ears. 

Rey opens her eyes even though she can’t remember closing them. She is still standing wrapped in Ben Solo’s arms but she is somewhere else entirely, where she is not sure. She peers into the gloom around her. As her senses return so does a hot spurt of anger. For the second time in 5 minutes Rey shoves Ben hard on the shoulders and this time manages to put a few meters between their bodies. From her new vantage point she can make out that she seems to be standing in a tight alley way, bright lights of a city street burn at one end and she sees people and cars rush by. Are they still in Lodnon?

‘What did you DO’ bellows Rey as Ben regards her uncertainly from across the alley way. ‘Apparated’ he replies in a clipped staccato. ‘We are outside the Savoy. My family keep a suite here for when we are in London. We will stay here. We can talk. Come’ He holds out a hand clad in a thick black leather glove. 

Rey stares at it incredulous and then cranes her neck to the entrance of the alley, meters away. She can now see the iconic frontage of the hotel glowing with golden light as a black cab swishes past. A small trickle of excitement rises in her belly. He is here. Bossy- yes, manhandling her physically- yes, but here. For her. In this life, not just her hidden Hogwarts life. She gazes at the hotel and imagines a sumptuous room, a warm bath, a long night ahead and then she looks down at frayed cuffs of her old jeans, the daggy, falling apart converse on her feet and of course the hideous garbage bag of a winter coat covering her body. She looks up at that leather gloved hand straining towards her, waiting to take her away from all this and something inside of her gives and up dies. 

Back at Hogwarts, in his rooms she can handle his domineering side when it raises its head, in fact sometimes she downright loves his penchant to be in control and to take her to task both verbally and physically. But, Rey realises with a small jolt, at Hogwarts she has some agency. She is respected by her teaches and her peers, she has prospects and (she hopes) a life ahead of her. Here, on the dirty streets of this heaving metropolis she is really nothing. She has no power, just a lifetime of hardship that she has imprinted on this city. And so to be ordered about here, in this world, to be physically pushed and pulled….it’s wrong. She feels used and dirty, a way he has never made her feel before. The hotel at the end of the laneway feels as alien to her as if it were on Mars. She can’t walk in there with him, him in his beautiful leather boots, his tailored black winter overcoat with maroon silk lining, his ridiculously perfect hair. 

Rey looks from his outstretched, leather clad hand up into his pleading eyes. She pauses just one more second before her hand wraps around the aspen wand in her pocket and with the crack of a whip she removes herself from his glittering world with its cushy hotel room suite and back into her grimy little estate on the edge of east London.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Rey drops her eyes. She can’t look at him. Him. Standing here in his expensive Chelsea boots, his gorgeous black pea coat and those leather gloves. He looks like a Burberry model who has gotten very lost and somehow ended up behind the scenes at an Amy Winehouse music video shoot. Rey’s eyes fix on the ashtray on the coffee table, unable to raise her eyes to meet his again._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So while trying to get my head around this new quarantine way of life I am happily amusing myself writing this tangent fic set in The Heartbreak Prince world [https://archiveofourown.org/works/21796579/chapters/52011994]() created so beautifully by Diasterisms [https://archiveofourown.org/users/diasterisms/pseuds/diasterisms]()
> 
> I plan to let this little idea lead me where it may because right now I'm having fun. 
> 
> **Warning this chapter outlines some crappy parenting and makes oblique reference to drug use and alcoholism, however nothing overt or abusive**.

Chapter 5 

Rey lies on her bed staring at the water mark on the ceiling above her. Its colour is variegated from teak to light tan and while Rey’s eyes trace the shape for the millionth time in her life, her thoughts are very much elsewhere. She can dimly hear her parents in the front room, her mother is singing along to the radio, her voice already slurring slightly and its only 6pm. Her father’s voice is a low rumble, interrupted by the occasional long inhale and hiss of a lighter. They are getting ready to go out. The Cock and Tail, the dingy, low life pub attached to the east edge of the estate is hosting some crummy Christmas drinks and trivia night. Rey knows the routine.  
‘just a few pints’ will turn into shots, a blown out bar tab and a lock in. And add whatever her father seems to be smoking now into the mix and Rey knows she won’t see either of them again before 4am. 

When Rey had stumbled through the door 15 minutes earlier, feeling nauseous from her sudden apparating journey, her father had paused and looked up from the square of foil he was holding a lighter under. For a moment he had looked at her in confusion, apparently having forgotten that she was back in London. Then he had smiled in a slightly soft way as she probably came into focus and invited her to come and join them for a ‘pigs ear’. Rey had rolled her eyes, she hated her father’s mockney accent and his put on cockney rhyming slang. He wasn’t really from the east end and she knew it. Her mother had cackled from the sofa, a wine glass in her hand, reminding her father that Rey was too much of a ‘little miss priss’ to ever darken the door of a pub. 

Now Rey, eyes still fixed on the watermark idly wills them to hurry up and leave already so that she can be properly alone to have a complete and utter nervous breakdown. As the physical side effects of two apparations in the space of 5 minutes wear off Rey realises that she is continuing to feel nausea. A deep swirling unease has settled in her belly as her mind spins trying to unpick the events of the last 24hrs. 

He had come to find her. He had followed her to London.  
Rey’s stomach clenches but this time not with nausea, a slick spike of heat slices through her abdomen as the thought of him pursuing her enters her mind.  
_To be wanted. Desired._

The sudden heat is doused in ice as she remembers her rejection of him.  
_Stupid. Such a child, throwing a tantrum in the street._  
The leather gloved hand stretched towards her flashes in her minds eye as Rey squeezes her lids closed.  
_Why didn’t I just take his hand?_

Rey flings herself onto her stomach and pulls her lumpy pillow over her head as she feels hot tears spring into her eyes. She knows she has caused irrevocable damage to the fledgling little….what? What exactly is the name for what she and Professor Solo are doing? 

An affair? A dalliance? Messing about? Fucking? 

Certainly not a relationship and yet Rey has whipped herself into a tantrum just like a jealous and hysterical girlfriend. She has behaved as if he were her boyfriend, as if she had any _rights_ over him…his actions. And what’s more she has behaved like a _teenager_. Like a possessive teenager who can’t even communicate with the person she is fucking and storms off like a drama queen instead. 

Rey groans at the thought that she has behaved in an immature way like the other girls she, well, looks down on. She rolls onto her back and takes her pillow off her head and abruptly becomes aware that a third voice has joined her parents in the front room. 

Rey sits bolt upright on her bed, her pulse spiking and adrenaline racing through her veins causing her heart to drop to her stomach, her skin to prickle and her fists to clench. 

‘I’m a friend of Rey’s from school Mr Niima’ rumbles a voice that Rey would know anywhere.  
‘Oh right, right mate’ begins Rey’s father in his infuriatingly fake cockney accent until he is interrupted by Rey’s mothers shrill laugh  
‘A friend! Ain’t never ‘ad one of them before ‘as she love’ titters her mother ‘How much’d she pay ya to come and pretend?’ Rey’s mother apparently thinks this is the funniest idea in the world as she dissolved into riotous laughter. Rey can just picture her, swaying on her feet, wine glass clutched in one hand as she doubles over with mirth. 

_What is he doing here?_

Rey remains frozen in her bed as the horror of the situation sends icy fingers down her spine. Rey knows that if she ever faces a boggart again, THIS EXACT SCENARIO is what the blasted creature will manifest. 

Rey leaps to her feet as she hears her mother invite Professor Solo to stop pretending to be Rey’s friend and come have a drink with her instead. She flings her bedroom door open and a scene that is rapidly becoming her worst nightmare is laid out in front of her. Professor Solo is standing serenely in the front room while Rey’s mother, balancing a wine glass in one hand, rests the fingers of her other hand on Solo’s broad bicep. 

Solo’s eyes snap to Rey’s face the moment she appears and they sear her with their intensity. A burning, searching, tumultuous gaze that belies the smooth, calm set of his face as Rey’s mother sips her wine and lets her eyes slide over Rey like she is something she found on the bottom of her shoe. 

Rey’s father has been hovering near the door with both his and Rey’s mother’s coats in his hand. He obviously had answered the door just as they were about to leave.  
‘Come on love’ he says softly to Rey’s mother ‘Let let these two school chums catch up eh?’ He shoots Rey a quick glance as he bundles her mother into her coat and out the door. 

The front door closes behind them and for a moment the only sound is Rey’s mother’s laugh shrill and jarring as her parents make their way down the outer hallway of the estate. 

Ben’s eyes have never left hers since she opened her bedroom door. Her gaze is similarly fixed on his face. Ben takes a deep breath in and out, the muscles around his mouth working. 

Rey drops her eyes. She can’t look at him. Him. Standing here in his expensive Chelsea boots, his gorgeous black pea coat and those leather gloves. He looks like a Burberry model who has gotten very lost and somehow ended up behind the scenes at an Amy Winehouse music video shoot. Rey’s eyes fix on the ashtray on the coffee table, unable to raise her eyes to meet his again. 

‘I’m sorry to drop by unannounced’ he begins ‘I, I well the school has all the student addresses on file and I hope you will forgive the fact that I looked yours up, I just didn’t know how else to find you’ he finished lamely. 

At this, Rey’s eyes do shoot up to his as she narrows them, at first in confusion and then inexplicably she is overtaken by a sudden urge to giggle. Maybe it’s the bi-product of the adrenalin, maybe its just her brain’s way of trying… _somehow_ …to deal with the absurdity of him being here, maybe its his ridiculous _manners_ but Rey realises that she can’t hold back and a small laugh escapes her lips. 

Ben’s face hardens and for some reason this makes Rey laugh even harder. At this point she is aware that hysteria is looming and she is seconds away from this hilarity turning into open sobs.  
‘I’m delighted I amuse you Miss Niima’ Ben’s voice hisses, dangerously low and soft ‘I, on the other hand don’t find traipsing all the way from Scotland to London, being attacked in a freezing park with a bunch of house keys and then left alone in an alleyway particularly funny at all. I’m cold, I’m tired and I’m very hungry having skipped two meals trying to find you today, trying to find out if you are alright, if something had gone amiss that precipitated your sudden departure.’ He stops suddenly, his mouth twisting and hardening, his stare becoming challenging. 

Rey stares back, not knowing what to think. 

_He was worried about me._

The though pushes itself to the front of Rey’s mind. She pushes it away. Her mind feels like a choppy ocean, she is drowning and she grabs for the one thing he said that _makes sense_. 

‘You’re hungry? I nicked some money from my Dad’s wallet earlier today and bought some bits from Tescos. I can make you something?’ Her voice sounds strange to her ears, too high and breathless. Solo stares at her for a moment like she has grown a second head and then he lets out a shaky breath.  
‘Yeah I could eat’ he replies his face smoothing and becoming impassive as Rey walks past him and into the tiny kitchen. 

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

They sit on her bed. Cross legged with plates on the mattress between them. Rey can’t quite get her head around Solo in this position, his boots on the floor and his too big body folded into this child like pose. He however seems at ease, picking at the Ploughmans’ spread that she had planned for her own dinner. Stilton, crackers, a cut up green apple, branston’s and Christmas ham. 

They had prepared the food in silence, standing side by side in the kitchen, Rey passing Ben items and him preparing them without needing to be told what to do. A part of Rey’s mind that was not filled with shock and static at the events of the last few hours notes just how well they worked together, perfectly in sync, just as they were when they were in bed. 

Without needing to discuss it, they had bypassed the hovel of a front room and seated themselves on her bed in the positions they sat in now. They had eaten in silence, the air between them crackling with words needing to be said but both seeming content to be silent a little longer. 

Ben slides the last slice of apple into his mouth and stacks the plates on Rey’s bedside table and leans back against the window running along the wall by the bed. He stretches his long legs out across the bed as Rey mirrors his pose. 

‘Has it always been like this Rey?’ He asks quietly. Rey is infinitely glad for the position change meaning they now sit side by side, shoulders brushing and that he isn’t looking at her face as he asks this question. Rey knots her hands together in her lap and studies them for a long beat before she answers. 

‘its been like this for a long time’ she murmurs. Ben is silent in response, his body leaning fractionally closer to her, the pressure on her shoulder from his increasing slightly as she feels his warmth bleed into her. His silence isn’t heavy or awkward, its warm, inviting. He knows there is more to say and he is giving her the chance to say if…if she wants to. 

Rey clears her throat ‘I, if I really think back….’ She stops unsure how to even put what she wants to say into words, she has never spoken about this, in fact she has never really let her thoughts dwell on what she is about the say before. 

‘I am almost certain that there was a time when life was normal…nice’ she falters over her words. ‘I must have been very small but I remember a house in the country, with flowers in window boxes. I…I think I had an attic bedroom because I can picture gable windows and a sloping roof. And my Grandmother lived nearby.’ Rey breaks off, her knotted hands untangling to curl into fists, her fingernails biting into the flesh of her palms. 

Rey feels Ben shift very slightly beside her and his long fingers reach out and gently caress the clenched fist nearest to him. His fingers ghost gently over her knuckles making small circles back and forth. 

‘What did it look like? The room.’ He asks  
‘I don’t know’ Rey replies, ‘It must be too long ago, since then its just been room after room like this…give or take a few holes in the plaster and stains on the roof’ 

Ben’s body shifts and takes Rey’s along with it and suddenly they are lying side by side on her bed with their heads together on her pillow, the watermark on the ceiling above them like a watchful eye. 

‘Tell me what you imagined then’ Ben asks  
‘What?’ squeaks Rey as she lifts her head for Ben to tuck his arm around her and pull her into his side  
‘Your room, when you were a little girl, what did you wish your room to look like?’ He pushes her with his question, his voice slightly louder and using that tone that expects an answer. Rey’s brow furrows and she bites her bottom lip. The question has thrown her. _How does he know? How does he know how often she lay on these council flat beds, staring at the cockroaches climbing the walls and let her mind take her into a fantasy world of her own making?_

Rey huffs out a breath. ‘Pink’ she murmurs suddenly embarrasses by her clichéd childhood desires ‘Pink with white trimming around the windows, and butterflies, I was obsessed with butterflies’ 

Ben shifts by her side and she sees him lift his blackthorn wand. He flicks it gently in an arc over their bodies and Rey gasps in amazement as the walls of her dingy room turn a soft pink, the windows begin to appear like they would in a gables attic bedroom of a country cottage and a light shade flows around the bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. Rey holds her breath as she feels Solo concentrate, his wand pointed at the newly appeared light shade. Small pink butterflies appear on the fabric of the shade with each swish of his wand.  
‘Like this?’ He rasps softly. Rey can’t speak, something is in her throat and her eyes are blurring with unshed tears. 

‘Its perfect’ She manages to whisper and then she cocks her head to the side and her hand slowly creeps up the sleeve of Ben’s black Henley until she softly wraps her hand around his wand hand, her index finger sliding up further to rest on the firm wood of the wand. Ben’s hand flexes slightly under her touch but she meets no resistance as she exerts the gentlest of pressures to move his wand and hand where she will. Murmuring a charm under her breath she flicks the wand and a stream of golden butterflies issue from his wand and flutter upwards to make a moving ring under the lightshade. 

The second Rey casts the charm the _intimacy_ of what she has just done washes over her. To use another wizards or witch’s wand is not really the _done thing_ but to use it while it is in another’s hand, in the midst of spell casting…Rey can’t really distinguish if the intimacy she feels is like she ‘brushed her teeth with his toothbrush’ kinda intimate or if she ‘touched a part of him that no one else has’ kinda intimate. 

Ben’s arm tightens around her body gripping her to his side and his fingers under hers on his wand unwind to lace through hers so that they hold the wand together 

‘Do it again’ he breaths 

_Ok not sharing a toothbrush intimate…the other kind thinks Rey_. 

‘Well I always loved fairy lights’ smiles Rey as she searches in her mind for the right charm. Before she consciously thinks of one, words spring to her mouth and Ben’s hand moves, guiding her as she incants 

_‘lumos fae forma’_

Tingling threads of magic wrap themselves like the lightest of bindings around Rey and Ben’s intertwined fingers and seem to combine and channel into the wood of his wand.  
Rey gasps at the sensation and lets out a delighted laugh as hundreds of tiny golden glowing lights hover around the ceiling like tiny stars. 

Rey turns her head on Bens shoulder and angles her eyes up only to find him staring down at her, a beautiful, delighted smile on his face, his eyes warm and almost twinkling.  
‘What else?’ he asks ‘Tell me what else would have made you happy’.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! 
> 
> I love the little comments I received, they spurred me along to continue this niche little dalliance xo
> 
> WARNING- There is some descriptions of drug paraphernalia in this chapter...

The room is dim when Rey opens her eyes. Above her a handful of fairy lights still twinkle up near the ceiling and an errant golden butterfly glides haphazardly around the light globe. The light outside the window is the hazy orange of a London night but somehow Rey senses it’s the early morning, maybe 4am. 

The hour of the wolf. 

Rey’s eyes fall from the window to the large figure occupying the majority of her small bed. Professor Solo lies on his back with his head turned away from Rey, thrown back in sleep the corded tendons of his neck stretch beautifully down to the shoulder of the arm that is currently holding Rey firmly to his side. His other hand is tucked just inside the waistband of his jeans, fingers splayed across his left hip and lower abdomen. 

Rey’s eyes rake down his sleeping form, lingering on his hand, his pose is somehow an absolute mix between adorable and unbearably sexy. His face is completely relaxed as Rey’s eyes trace his features, his hair curls gently across his forehead, his generous lips soft in sleep. 

Rey realises with a sudden jolt that this is the first time they have spent the night together. It is also, Rey realises, the first time they have shared a bed, couch…any private space and not had sex. 

Solo lets out a long exhale and his right arm pulls Rey’s body closer into his side. She lowers her head and nuzzles gently into the crook of his shoulder allowing her eyes to drift shut again as she feels her breathing sync in time with his. 

Suddenly Rey’s eyes snap open as she hears the noise that must have woken her in the first place. A small thump, like something heavy falling onto carpet and the chink of glass hitting glass. 

Rey gently lifts Solo’s arm off her body and into the air. An act that feel unreasonably hard. _‘really who needs arms this big anyway’_ she mentally huffs as she wriggles her body off the edge of the bed and softly lowers her Professors arm down by his side. He rolls his head on the pillow and curls his body into the warmth that she has left behind but he doesn’t wake. Rey tiptoes across the room and carefully shuts the door behind her. 

The living room is shrouded in shadows but the pilot light from the cooker in the kitchen combined with the general light pollution of London seeping through the windows allows Rey to see the familiar sight before her. 

The coffee table is littered with detritus. Empty bottles, unwashed pint glasses, matches and twists of foil dot the table. Rey’s father lies on his back on the sofa, one hand flung out into the space between him and the coffee table. Alarmingly the still smoking butt of a joint is hanging from his fingertips. Rey sees the ashtray which she assumes was previously resting on his belly is now overturned on the floor by the sofa, its contents spewing over the carpet. Most likely the noise from its fall was what had woken her. 

Rey sighs. _‘well it wouldn’t be a proper visit home if we didn’t do this routine would it?’_ she hisses in her head as she carefully makes her way to the kitchen  
_‘I hear its so important for families to have traditions…I wouldn’t have wanted to miss this one’_ continues her angry inner voice as she gathers cleaning supplies and sets to work clearing the coffee table and turning her attention to the mess of the ashtray on the floor. 

Finally, crouched beside her father as he slumbers on the sofa Rey reaches out and slips the smoking joint from his finger tips and stubs it out into the now empty and upright ashtray. Rey turns her eyes back to her father’s face and with her cleaning cloth she dabs at the dried vomit at the corner of his mouth. As she does so a flicker leaps at the edge of her consciousness and she raises her eyes from her father’s face, over the back of the sofa and to the door of her bedroom. 

Bracketed in the doorway is Solo, he leans against the doorframe, his face shrouded in shadows but Rey can feel the burn of his eyes as they bore into hers. 

The hot, acid burn of humiliation lances through Rey’s belly. This is not to be seen. This is her private shame. Even after last night, what he had seen and what she had tentatively shared with him, this base act of cleaning up her father’s vomit while HE watches her is too much. Rey chokes in a shuddering breath, frozen with the cloth on her father’s face. 

Solo stares at her for a beat longer and then turns and without a word, disappears into the gloom of her bed room 

_‘probably getting his shoes and gathering his things to leave’_ thinks Rey. _‘Why would he hang around for this’_ the acidic voice in her head continues. _‘like he is really going to want to fuck you, still find you sexy after he has seen who you really are, where you come from’_

Rey rolls her father into the recovery position on the couch _’although choking on your own vomit is exactly what you deserve’_ she huffs and then she stands, squares her shoulders and move towards her bedroom. Prepared to accept his rejection with her head held high. 

Solo’s wand casts a low glow across her room and Rey is confused to see him, boots and coat on, standing with his back to her, both doors of her wardrobe flung open, rifling through her clothes. Rey watches in shock as a few basic items of clothing fly across the room from the wardrobe to the bed where her ancient YMCA gym bag lies open. Solo flicks the hand holding his wand towards her small chest of draws and she sees underwear and socks join the pile of clothing in her bag. Her shabby bathroom bag that rests on the bedside table is next and the gym bag zips itself and finally Solo turn to face her. 

His face is calm and soft but his eyes are still burning at her with the intensity she sensed from across the living room as he had watched her with her father.

‘Rey’ he starts, his voice low, still tinged with sleep but laced with a dark urgency that makes her skin tingle. ‘Come with me. Let me take you away from all this, just for a small time.’ 

As he speaks he takes a halting step towards her and extends his hand in a facsimile of his pose yesterday evening in the alley outside the Savoy. However, this time his tone is soft, there is no command to it, just an overwhelming sense of longing tinges his request. 

Rey searches his features in the dim light, hunting for signs of pity or disgust that she had prepared herself to see. Finding none lets her eyes lock with his as he utters a soft plea,  
‘please’ 

Rey lowers her eyes and before she can let her brain catch up to her heart, she slips her feet into her ratty converse beside the bed, drapes her satchel over her shoulder and slides her small hand into his outstretched massive one. 

Ben Solo releases a long shaky breath the belies the calm set of his features 

_’he thought I would say no, that I would reject him again’_ realises Rey has Ben’s wand flicks towards her gym bag and it vanishes from sight. 

Ben gently tugs on Rey’s hand and she willingly lets him enfold her in his arms, pressing her flush against his solid body.  
‘Ready?’ he rumbles in her ear. She nods as she all but burrows her head into the expanse of his chest


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7 

Maybe it’s because she was prepared this time Rey muses, or maybe it’s the fact that she is wrapped so completely in Ben Solo’s arms, her eyes closed as her face presses into his pectorals with his steady heartbeat strong under her ear. Whatever the reason, this experience of apparating felt much gentler compared with yesterday’s crushing, haphazard journeys. 

Rey leans her forehead into Solo’s chest, her eyes are still closed and she breathes in his scent for a long moment. With her arms tight around his lower back, one hand creeps down to his firm ass to press him closer against her. She hears and feels Solo chuckle softly as his hands move up her back and into her hair, gently exerting pressure on her jawline, lifting her face to his. 

With her eyes still closed, Rey accepts his kiss in a manner that feel like supplication. Like receiving the Eucharist, she parts her lips as his touch hers. Feather light for a moment then deepening as he sandwiches Rey’s lower lip between both of his and gently sucks. Rey responds in the same languid manner, eyes still closed and the world still spinning from apparating, Rey caresses his upper lip with her bottom teeth. She adds the slightest of pressure and gently bites that pouty lip between both her teeth. Solo rumbles a deep laugh again that Rey feels more than hears as he strokes the back of her head before taking a very small step back and away from her. Rey wants to mewl in protest but the shock of separation forces Rey’s eyes open. The increased distance between them lets Rey take in their surroundings for the first time. 

Initially Rey assumes they are in the same alleyway outside the Savoy that they had apparated to yesterday. It is the sounds that reach Rey first, a rumble of voices with the occasional shout breaking though the general hum. 

‘Oysters, get ‘em by the dozen, best price in town and I tell no fibs’  
‘Cockles and mussels!  
Make your girl a proper Essex chowder!  
Get in get in, this is this best you’ll ever get and I’ll make you a deal.  
Come on over love, ere we go darlin’ ere we go- two for a tenner, two for a tenner’ 

The cries overlap and blend into one another as Rey moves away from Solo and steps towards the source of the noise. 

The small alleyway they have apparated into opens into a wide space filled with the soft glow of a variety of light sources. The winter sun is a few hours off from providing any useful illumination but hundreds of festoon and fairy lights reveal to Rey an arched glass panelled roof supported by thick green steel girders. Under the arched roof stretches what appears to be hundreds of small stalls all demarcated in the same green steel structure that supports the roof. 

The next sense to assault Rey is smell. As her eyes adjust to the light filled market before her, she realises that curling under her nostrils is the most exquisite collections of scents that she has experienced outside of the Hogwarts kitchens. 

The Ploughman’s she had shared with Solo last night suddenly seems long ago and Rey’s traitorous stomach lets out a loud growl. A deep chuckle behind her draws Rey’s attention from the sights (and smells) as she feels her professor’s body come flush against her back. 

Rey turns and cranes her neck to meet his gaze that is roving over her face. His mouth is quirked at one corner but his dark eyes swirl with a mix of gentle amusement guarded with a hint of wariness. 

_He is still worried I might bolt again _Rey realises.__

____

__

She reaches back to slip her small hand into his large one as she states ‘well this isn’t the Savoy’

‘No’ comes Solo’s clipped reply. 

Rey studies the sight before her again, her eyes settling on the back and white lettering of a sign supported by an arch of green steel. 

‘This is Borough Market’ she murmurs in confusion 

‘Yes’ comes another clipped reply from behind her

Rey turns to face him and raises her hands to palm the double row of buttons on his pea coat. She studies her fingers on the black wool for a moment, her brow furrowed slightly. 

‘I thought we would go to your hotel room’ she mutters, feeling inexplicably shy for a moment. ‘I thought we would…’ 

she trails off as her right hand curls around the black button above his heart. Solo’s right arm comes around Rey’s body and presses firmly against her lower back bringing her body tight against his, his lips ghost over her brow before she feels his equine nose nudge her own, a silent request for her to raise her head. 

Rey’s eyes meet his and she draws a quick breath at the desire she sees swirling in them.  
‘Oh we will, go to my hotel room’ he rasps, his mouth brushing gently against the corner of hers. 

‘In fact, I plan for you to spend a considerable amount of time becoming intimately familiar with my-’ 

He pauses, his eyes darting down to her lips, his hand tightening fractionally on her back as he grinds ever so gently into her stomach 

‘-room’ he finishes smirking as Rey’s lips part, cheeks flush and her breathing speeds up. 

‘But first’ he continues, straightening up and peering over Rey’s head ‘Its morning and I’m starving and this happens to be my favourite early morning food stop in London’

He glances down at her with a half smile tugging at his lips, his eyes lighter than she has often seen.

_He’s excited_ Rey realises as he loosens his hold on her and tucks her left hand into his and pulls her out of the alleyway and towards the entrance of the covered market. 

‘Have you ever been?’ he asks as they pass under the raised railroad tracks leading to London bridge and into the throng of stalls. 

‘No, I mean I have heard of it but um well my childhood didn’t really consist of fun family outings’ Rey trails off. 

Solo mercifully remains silent but pulls her into his side as they walk, slinging his arm around her shoulders. It suddenly hits Rey what a relief this is. Him knowing. Him…. understanding this puzzle piece of who she is. Rey ponders that thought as they weave in and out of traders and market goers alike. 

_He understands_. 

_How can he understand?_ Rey muses, his life, what she has vaguely imagined of his childhood, is nothing like hers but she has a deep feeling that while he might not understand exactly what it has been like to live her life, somehow he does understand her and how her past fits her. 

_Pain_ she realises _he understands pain._

Rey is jolted from this thought process as Solo draws them to an abrupt stop out the font of what appears to be a fixed shop built into the stone supports of the raised railway line that rumbles above the arched market roof. In the dim interior of the shop Rey can make out giant round shapes piled on top of one another and she can hear a rush of trickling water but before she can figure out the source of the sound, a wafting aroma draws her attention back to the area in front of the shop. 

A man in a blue apron and flat cap swirls his tongs over what appears to be a giant grill of crispy potatoes while in front of him a large black device that looks like a giant vice grips a yellow half moon shaped object. heat radiates from the vice and the tantalising smell seems to be emanating from it as well 

‘Its cheese’ gasps Rey in an excited voice as she realises that the round items stacked inside the shop are enormous rounds of cheese. 

‘Too right its cheese love’ smiles the man in the apron ‘oldest cheesemonger in London right ‘ere. This ‘ere markets been trading for nigh on 1000 years and you mark my words there’s been a humble cheesemonger here since the very beginning. ‘ 

As he speaks, he deftly slings mounds of the crisped potatoes onto paper plates and sets them down beside the vice gripping what Rey now realises is a half-round of deliciously melting cheese. With gloves on, the man removes the cheese from under the flame and with a palette knife slides ropes of melted cheese down over the waiting plates of potatoes. 

Rey swallows quickly as her mouth waters and she feels Solo quirk an eyebrow down at her as he hands the cheesemonger a tenner and hands Rey a piping hot plate. 

‘yummmmm’ she utters as she forks up a piece of potato dripping with cheese and pops it into her mouth 

‘Ow but hot!’ she exclaims as Solo lets out a bark of laughter next to her. He guides them to some stools by a low burning brazier. 

‘I love watching you eat’ Solo says as they sit. Rey looks up from her plate with a piece of potato making her cheeks bulge. She scrunches up her nose and for a moment considers feeling embarrassed. I mean, surely she is meant to be restrained and dainty and not shovelling this delicious concoction into her gob like it might be her last meal. 

But then she thinks _fuck it._

‘Well I’m glad to hear it Sir’ she replies swallowing and looking him directly in the eyes and smiling at full wattage ‘Because I love eating.’ 

Ben Solo returns her frank stare before also retuning her smile, his face rearranging itself like human origami, his eyes crinkling beautifully as his not-quite-perfect dimples appear. 

They sit like that for a moment, facing each other, hunched on stools, knee to knee with plates balanced precariously. The noise and bustle flows around them, surrounds them as their eyes remain locked, smiles beaming. 

Rey swears in that moment that she feels his smile. She feels it lodge itself in her chest. Embed itself in her sternum and project some kind of shining, bright light outwards from her chest. 

_Happiness_ thinks Rey _this is a moment of perfect happiness_. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I adored Borough Market when I lived in London, especially in winter when the sunlight is muted and the lights twinkle in the cold air. 
> 
> The market really is about 1000 years old, here is a dip into its history  
> Borough Market.
> 
> I loved the time between bonfire night and Christmas when the nights began to draw in, the clocks changed and the air was crisp. Winter hadn't yet become the bore and drear or January, February, March. 
> 
> The cheese dish that they eat is Raclette. Its Swiss in origin I think and I first ate it in Germany where it was traditional on New Years Eve. 
> 
> I was delighted to find it sold in this manner at the Borough Markets and it is HANDS DOWN one of the top ten foods I have ever put in my mouth. Here is a Video. I found of how it is made.
> 
> I can't for the life of me remember which cheese shop I used to go to but there are several at the Market. The one I remember was dim and had an indoor waterfall running in order to keep the air moist and the cheese at the appropriate level of mould.


End file.
